TV Highlights

Producer, Director

About This Person

From All Movie Guide: Carol Reed was born into a family with some of the best artistic/theatrical credentials of any film director who ever lived. His father was Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree (1853-1917), the leading actor of his day and, among many other credits, the stage's first Henry Higgins, and his mother was Tree's mistress, May Pinney Reed. Born in London, Carol Reed was educated at Kings School, Canterbury, just slightly ahead of his fellow future filmmaker Michael Powell. Reed's father passed away when he was ten years old, leaving his mother to raise him with help from a small bequest. He was drawn to the theater from an early age and wanted to become an actor, but his mother had little confidence in his ability to earn a living in that field, and encouraged him to try farming.